David Vernon Williams

Professor David Vernon Williams is a professor, and former Deputy Dean of the University of Auckland's Faculty of Law. He came from the Hawke's Bay region of New Zealand, and was educated at Wanganui Collegiate School.

His formal tertiary education qualifications include undergraduate degrees in history and in law (BA/LLB) from Victoria University of Wellington, a graduate degree in law (BCL) from the University of Oxford, England, where he was a Rhodes Scholar at Balliol College, and a doctoral research qualification from the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (PhD) that included an analysis of colonial legal history in New Zealand, and a Diploma in Theology from the University of Oxford (DipTheol).

He is a barrister and solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand and holds a practising certificate to act as a barrister. He was employed as a legal academic at universities in England, Tanzania, and New Zealand from 1971 to 1991, and during that time he wrote numerous published articles and book chapters on issues related to colonial law, indigenous law and the Treaty of Waitangi.